The Last Remnant Battle Mechanics, News Update September 27, 2008

During combat you don’t control a handful of god-like warriors in the Last Remnant, you control multiple parties each consisting of up to five characters. However, the command system is quite similar to your run of the mill turn based RPG. Instead of selecting fight you give each union commands like “time to get physical!” which orders a union to use physical attacks on a nearby group of enemies. You might not want to get too close to the free roaming monsters, though. Once an enemy union and player union are in melee combat range they enter into a state of deadlock and are forced to fight until one obliterates the other. When you’re in deadlock you can use the “tear them to shreds!” command to attack the deadlocked target. Not all of the commands represent an all out attack. “Attack, but stay healthy” is a more balanced command where you attack close ranged enemies while healing. “Time to get mystical” has a union cast spells from a distance and “back us up” tells a union to do a sniping attack from the target’s back side. After all friendly unions are issued commands a round of combat plays out.

The morale meter on the top of the screen adds an interesting twist. When sprits are high you deal more damage and take less. If morale is low the opposite happens. This sounds like its going to be difficult to make a comeback if you’re losing, but battle commands also change depending on your morale level. Square Enix probably has some kind of limit break style reversal in the cards.

Basically, the Last Remnant’s combat system sounds like a turn based RPG with multiple parties. What do you think of it?